segunda-feira, outubro 08, 2007

Statement to parliament by the leader of FRETILIN parliamentary group on the occasion of the discussion of the General Budget of the State for the period July to December 2007.

Mr. President of the National Parliament

Excellencies, Illustrious Members of Parliament, the People of Timor-Leste,

The National Parliament, through its specialized commissions has heard explanations on this budget from the Members of this de facto Government principally the Minister for Finance.

During the debate in the generality, we have also already heard statements and responses from his Excellency Mr. Kay Rala Xanana Gusmao. Despite this, we of the FRETILIN group, the de facto opposition group, are not convinced with all of these explanations and arguments, and are still concerned with this general budget of the state for the period of 1 July to 31 of December 2007. As such, I want to reaffirm the concerns which I and my fellow members of parliament from the FRETILIN group have already expressed.

1. We know that prior to this budget, there was already in effect the one-twelfth system of continuing expenditure beyond the end of the fiscal/budget from the previous government, which is being combined with this budget for the transition period until the 31 st of December with a retroactive character (the one twelfth budget). There is no reporting whatsoever available regarding the expenditures pursuant to the one-twelfth budget, therefore we are unable to know how to measure the budget execution capacity of this government in relation to a very large amount of money for only two remaining months, until the 31 st of December 2007.

2. Article 115, line 1. d) of the Constitution of the Republic states that it is within the power of the government to prepare a "Plan and General Budget of the State" and to execute such upon approval by the National Parliament. This means that there is no "General Budget of the State" unless there is also a "Plan". But what we have now found is that we have only a budget before us. There is no program, there is no plan of action, and there are no projects before us. As such there is no transparency and we don't know what this de facto government will do with this very large amount of money, where the money is going, because there is no projection or strategic vision of any sort. It is instead more like we are preparing a budget for a "corner shop". This budget has not transparency because it does not include the combined sources of funding from bilateral or multilateral donors. For these reasons, we have no idea how the National Parliament will be able to monitor the budget execution in accordance with our constitutional obligations.

3. The amount for salaries and wages has risen dramatically compared with the previous government's budget. This is also the case with the amount for goods and services which is extremely large in comparison to proposed development capital and minor capital. Why? Because we now have by far many more members of government and civil servants and political appointees have increased much more than under the FRETILIN government for which it was always being criticized. But ultimately they are much worse. For example, in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs there is a line item to pay for civil servants who are politically appointed in the amount of $490,000. Similarly the amount for goods and services for district prisons in the Ministry of Justice is very large. What does all this mean? How is this budget going to lift the economy and reduce poverty? This budget is simply to effect expenditures or just to make purchases, to help the machinery of the state to function, to give work to the friends and family of members of government, to widen the path for corruption and to fatten those who work with the government or are in partnership with the government, but will not have a significant impact for the livelihoods of the poor in our country. Is this what is called "reform"?

4. This government has changed or greatly diverged in this budget from its own program or "declaration of political intentions" for the short term, which has already been approved by the National Parliament in the past weeks. They themselves are already not complying with the promises that they made during their campaign and the priorities set out in their own program. They presented themselves as angels who could resolve all the problems, and only knew how to condemn the FRETILIN government. Now we can see they do not have a clear notion or a single budget line item on how to resolve the problem of the displaced persons and the victims of the 2006 crisis. All they propose is some little funding to provide for the humanitarian needs of the displaced persons. The same goes for the problem of Alfredo Reinado and the petitioners. How will they find solutions for these problems? Is it perhaps that they will not need one single cent to do this? They want to assist the development of the private sector and to create employment, but Mr. Joao Goncalves, de facto Minister for Development and Economy, has already publically stated that the government will not create any jobs because the funding to his ministry is only small. The government stated in its short term priorities that it wanted to accelerate the payment of pensions to veterans and liberation combatants, and to distribute money to the elderly but this budget does not have any line items where it can do this, but perhaps because they have already received the political advantage with their promises, they can now forget about this promise. When will they make these payments? They say that they want to consolidate the data on veterans and ex-combatants and to improve the law even though this law had already been prepared by the previous government. Instead they have promised to commence making these payments in 2008, but how are we supposed to believe them? We are going from promise to merely another promise.

5. This government also wants to transfer $40 million from the petroleum fund. To do what? We know that there are sufficient funds in the treasury account to effect expenditures until the 31st of December 2007. This is because there are at least $122 million which can be spent within the six month period of this budget. This is from also looking at carry-over line items from the previous year which will be appropriated into the treasury account. So there is still enough money and there is no need to transfer any more money from the petroleum fund. The government is determined to force the transfer of this money and it is because of this that they have now quickly submitted an amendment to buy four generators. We don't understand why because two or three days ago the Secretary of State for Electricity did not say anything in this regard when he met with the infrastructure committee, but suddenly started to say that the generators were in a bad condition but did not properly explain why the generators were in a bad condition, perhaps because he would have a problem with the President of the Republic who made public statements as the defender of the poor, when he was Prime Minister, that they could make electricity connections as they wanted. The use of electricity has overtaken the capacity of the machines. Because of this, we do not believe that buying new generators will resolve the electricity problems.

6. This budget will allocate funds to the Task Force to fight poverty in the office of the President of the Republic. It is supposed to be for monitoring, but monitoring what? Perhaps it is to merely distribute money in the next months? We want to clearly say that we believe this line item is unnecessary, above all because programs for the reduction of poverty are a function of the government or the executive.

7. The big surprise for us was seeing the line item in the budget for the office of the Secretary of State for the Autonomous Region of Oecussi. Is this also reform? This government is confusing an autonomous region with a region with special administrative and economic treatment, as these two things are not the same. To refer to an autonomous region is violating article 5 of the Constitution of the Republic. Because of this illegality, references to this secretariat of state and its line items in the budget also have to be removed.

Mr. President of the National parliament, Excellencies

Illustrious Members

People of Timor-Leste

With these few words, the FRETILIN group declares that this government does not have sensibility, does not have coherence, does not have seriousness, does not have honesty and is not ready to govern and develop the Timor-Leste nation. The government's program says one thing, the budget demonstrates something else. This is a budget without a plan, is ill-prepared and is of no worth. As Ms. Emilia Pires, the de facto Minister for Finance herself acknowledged, to properly prepare a budget a minimum of 4 months is required. So it is better that you go and prepare to make it better.